


The Trelaw Prophecy/The Trelaw Family

by winter_hiems



Category: L'Homme qui rit | The Man Who Laughs - Victor Hugo, The Grinning Man - Philips & Teitler/Grose & Morris & Philips & Teitler/Grose
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Blind Character, Body Image, Canon Disabled Character, Chronic Pain, Don't copy to another site, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, F/M, Family, Family Bonding, Family Feels, Family Fluff, Father-Son Relationship, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Light Angst, Long Lost/Secret Relatives, Mother-Son Relationship, Self-Esteem Issues, Tenderness, canon blind character, soft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-12
Updated: 2020-09-12
Packaged: 2021-03-07 02:08:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,889
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26429140
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/winter_hiems/pseuds/winter_hiems
Summary: Twenty years ago, the Trelaws were exiled and their son was taken from them.Today, they return to England, and Gwynplaine gets to meet his parents for the first time in two decades.
Relationships: Ann Bradshaw | Lady Trelaw/Linnaeus Clancharlie | Hazlitt Trelaw, Dea/Gwynplaine | Grinpayne | Gwynplaine Trelaw
Kudos: 9





	The Trelaw Prophecy/The Trelaw Family

Dea’s hand in his was the only thing keeping him tethered to earth. He knew he ought to be happy, but all Gwynplaine could feel was terror. 

He was going to see his parents. For the first time in two decades, he was going to see his parents. 

Angelica had come to him two weeks before, smiling the same smile she’d worn when she made him a lord. “I have just revoked your parents’ exiles,” she told him. “They will be allowed to come home.” 

At those words, Gwynplaine had started trembling, and he felt like he hadn’t stopped since. 

He wanted to see them, of course he did. His mother and father who’d fought so hard to make life better for the common people, only to lose their son and be sent from their homeland, never to return. 

They had spent the intervening years in a nearly-ruined house on the banks of the Lake of Geneva in Switzerland, but at the news of their exile being ended and after being told that their son was in Bristol waiting for them, they had rushed home. 

“I’m scared, Dea,” Gwynplaine whispered, taking care that his words wouldn’t carry to anyone else in the crowd. (The return of a lord was no small thing. Aside from Gwynplaine, Dea, and Angelica, they were also surrounded by people both highborn and low, come to see the Trelaws return to England.) 

Dea squeezed his hand. “They’re your parents, they love you. They wouldn’t have come all the way here from Switzerland if they didn’t want to see you.” 

“They haven’t seen me,” he replied. The knowledge that their son had been disfigured would be quite different from looking upon his face. Right now, Gwynplaine’s carved smile was covered by red cloth, carefully tied so that the harbour winds wouldn’t tear it off. Removing it would wait until they were in the palace; just because Gwyn was growing more comfortable with his disfigurement didn’t mean that he was willing to show his face to anyone and everyone who’d decided to turn up today. 

“What if I have a nerve attack?” he murmured. 

“I’ll stay by you,” said Dea. “You’ll be alright. And the pain will pass, it always does.” 

“I don’t want him to see me like that,” Gwynplaine breathed. “I barely remember father, but he always seemed so strong…” 

Dea patted his hand. “You’re strong. He’d be a fool not to see that.” 

“Oh god, the ship’s pulling in…” Gwynplaine gripped Dea’s hand and resisted the urge to run. He felt like he was going to pass out. 

The two people on deck were older than Gwynplaine remembered them. Twenty years had added grey hairs and worry lines. 

Their age made Gwynplaine feel younger, inexperienced. The Trelaws were legends; how could he possibly be one of them? 

But it was too late to turn and flee. They were coming down the ship’s gangplank, where Angelica greeted them. 

Stress blurred her words in his ears until she indicated him with her hand, saying, “May I present your son, Lord Gwynplaine Trelaw?” 

Gwynplaine let go of Dea’s hand and stood up straighter. The sound of the ocean roared in his ears, drowning out all other sound. He took a few steps towards the strangers who were his parents. “Mother,” he said, “Father.” 

For a moment the Trelaws stared at him and said nothing. Then they both rushed forward and embraced him. 

A few seconds later, Gwynplaine felt himself break. He’d told himself that he’d be strong for this, but now he was crying into his father’s shoulder, overwhelmed by the sensation of being held by his parents after all this time. When he pulled back, there were tears in both his parents’ eyes. His mother murmured something about how she always knew he’d end up tall like his father. 

Gwyn took a breath to steady himself, then he found Dea’s hand and drew her forwards. “This is Dea,” he told his parents. “She’s my fiancée.” 

Dea stretched her free hand out. “Pleased to meet you.” 

He watched his parents take in Dea’s white eyes, and the fact that she wasn’t quite facing them, before they both shook her hand in greeting. 

*

The carriage ride back passed awkwardly. As they were driven to the palace, his parents often glanced out of the window, taking in the changes to the city since they’d been gone. There was no time for Gwynplaine’s entire life story, so the conversation was exclusively about current affairs; the changes that Angelica and Gwyn were bringing to the government, and the fact that he was staying in the royal palace. Gwynplaine knew that he’d inherited several fine houses from his father, but he hadn’t yet visited any of them. 

*

When they finally arrived at the palace, the four of them – Gwynplaine, Dea, and his parents – ended up in one of the many drawing rooms. 

Gwyn knew that he couldn’t delay it much longer. He thought about saying out loud that he was going to do it, but in the end he couldn’t bear to announce it. Keeping his gaze fixed on a section of carpet, he squeezed Dea’s hand, reached up, and untied the cloth around his face. 

He heard a sharp intake of breath, and found himself unable to raise his eyes to his parents’ reactions, until his father breathed, “Who did this to you?” 

Gwynplaine looked up. His mother had a shaking hand clamped over her mouth. His father looked ready to kill something, needing only a direction to turn intention into action. 

“Please,” said Gwynplaine quietly, “I forgave the man who did this to me, and he’s being punished. I don’t need you to go after him on my behalf.” A pause. “I know it’s not pretty.” 

“Don’t say that,” said his mother. She came over and gathered him into her arms. This close, Gwynplaine realised that their eyes were the same colour. “Don’t say that about yourself. Don’t ever say it. You’re my baby and you’re beautiful, you’ll always be beautiful to me.” 

By the time the hug was over, both of them were wiping away tears again. 

They ended up sitting on two of the sofas; Gwynplaine and Dea on one, Hazlitt and Ann on the other, while Gwyn told his story, with Dea filling in occasional details. He’d been worried about his father finding out about his nerve attacks, but Hazlitt seemed to take everything in his stride. 

Gwynplaine had hoped that he would get to have a proper conversation with his parents, but by the time he was done with his tale, there was a servant outside to take them to dinner with Angelica, and all personal conversation was impossible. 

*

Over the next few weeks, they did get to talk, and the strangest thing happened; they got to know each other. 

They ate breakfast together. They had meetings with Angelica together. 

Dea and Ann struck up an easy friendship. 

Ursus and Hazlitt reached a gruff kind of truce, made easier by the fact that Hazlitt liked Mojo on sight. 

Both Hazlitt and Ann approved of Dea, once they got to know her. 

(Hazlitt and Ann took Barkilphedro aside and made a few explicit, creative threats, though Gwynplaine didn’t know about that.) 

Gwynplaine volunteered to give up his lordship in favour of his father, but Angelica needed all the support in parliament that she could get, and having another lord on her side would add to that, so it was decided that both Gwynplaine and his father would be lords, with joint custody of the Trelaw lands and title. It helped for a smoother transition into the peerage for Gwynplaine; Hazlitt knew the responsibilities that came with a lordship, and could help his son learn them. 

Father and son were walking in the palace gardens one day in early spring. They were the only ones outside at the time, so Gwynplaine had forgone his usual scarf. 

His parents were gradually getting used to the state of their son’s face, but he knew that it still upset them – what had been done to him, the fact that there was nothing they could do to heal his face or ease his pain. So far he’d been lucky to only have minor nerve attacks around them, with little enough pain that he could lean against a wall until it passed. 

Today, his luck had run out. 

He could feel the first fingers of pain pricking their way across his face, and he knew in his bones that it was going to be a bad one. As they walked, he angled himself so that they were heading back towards the palace. Hopefully he could get inside and sit down before his father noticed that he was starting to hurt. 

Step by step towards the palace, and step by step the pain wrapped itself across his face like the bandage he wasn’t wearing today. 

It grew so agonising that he didn’t even notice that his legs had given out until he found himself kneeling on the grass, his father crouched next to him, asking what was wrong. Gwynplaine tried to reply, but all he managed was a noise somewhere between a groan and a whimper. 

“Your face?” asked Hazlitt, and Gwyn didn’t want to admit it, didn’t want his strong rebel father know that there were moments when his nerves left him in a useless heap of pain, but he couldn’t hide this, so he nodded. 

Even in his mid-fifties, Hazlitt was still a strong man. He slipped Gwynplaine’s arm across his shoulders and slowly raised him up until he was standing. 

The walk back to the palace was more like a stagger. Gwyn wasn’t looking where he was going, so he stumbled in the direction his father led him, barely registering that they’d entered the palace until he was lowered onto a sofa, where he collapsed back on the cushions, his eyes half-closed with pain. 

Hazlitt took Gwynplaine’s hand. “Is there anything I can do – some kind of sedative?” 

Gwynplaine shook his head. “No.” 

“But – but there must be something, I can’t just do nothing, I…” 

“There’s nothing you can do,” Gwynplaine said softly, “Nothing anyone can do.” 

His father cast about for something. “Shall I fetch Dea? Would it – comfort you to have her nearby?” 

“Yes, but –” Gwynplaine’s next words came out as an ashamed mumble. “I know it’s weak but – don’t want to be on my own.” He’d hardly ever been on his own during a nerve attack. There had always been someone around to stay by him. 

Slowly, and keeping careful hold of Gwynplaine’s hand, Hazlitt sat down beside his son. “It’s not weak. It’s just something you have to live with. I’ll stay with you. I can fetch Dea later.” 

His mind was a red-tinged haze, but he was brought out of the stupor by the sound of footsteps. His mother’s voice. “Hazlitt, what happened?” 

“It’s his nerves, Ann.” 

Gwynplaine spent the rest of the afternoon on the sofa, eyes closed, waiting for the pain to pass. His father held his hand and his mother stroked his hair, and after a short time Dea came to join them. 

So Gwynplaine sat surrounded by mother and father and fiancée, and the pain was still there but it mattered less.

**Author's Note:**

> Being disabled can suck sometimes (trust me, I know). But one thing that makes the crappy days easier to bear is when you have a supportive family that know that all you can do for the rest of the day is crash out until things get better.
> 
> Hazlitt is very much a man of action, and knowing that there’s nothing he can do to directly alleviate Gwyn’s pain is very difficult for him to accept.
> 
> Switzerland is where Gwynplaine’s father goes when he’s been exiled from England in The Man Who Laughs. Even the house by the Lake of Geneva is in the book.
> 
> This fic was partially inspired by a text post from lordxgrinnyxboy on tumblr:  
> https://lordxgrinnyxboy.tumblr.com/post/628703544926666752/okay-but-partially-just-barely-book-flavored-au
> 
> Comments and kudos are always welcome <3
> 
> Disclaimer: I do not own the characters. I am not making money from this work.


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